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Table of contents
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- 1. B2B or door drops
- 2. What is too big?
- 3. Why use a brochure?
- 4. The advantages of catalogues
- 5. Why not deliver yourself?
- 6. Size of your campaigns
- 7. Common uses
- 8. The cost
- 9. Design and print
- 10. Repurpose your brochure
We generally recommend our clients keep the designs and formats of their pamphlets simple. However sometimes a multi page catalogue or a brochure is the best option.
If that is the case we are going to be dealing with some extra challenges in terms of distribution, design and storage. Let’s have a look at what we need to keep in mind when running catalogue or brochure drops.
B2B or door drops
The first thing to decide on when you are planning your brochure drop is whether you are going to be targeting businesses or households.
The type of brochure you will be creating will largely depend on this choice. In general delivering to businesses will allow you to use a larger format with more pages.
One of the main reasons for this is the fact that B2B deliveries are able to target fewer addresses. As such the distributor will carry fewer brochures.
When delivering your catalogues B2B we also tend to enter the businesses and deliver directly to a person. Not through a letterbox.
What is too big?
Your brochure or catalogue is too big if it has to be folded to make it through the letterbox.
If the distributor can’t carry a reasonable number of catalogues on their person in order to deliver effectively you will also run into cost issues.
Try to keep your brochure to an A5 format and up to 10 pages for door to door delivery. You can get away with more pages if you are looking at B2B campaigns.
Why use a brochure?
What could be the reason for a business to invest into catalogues rather than a single page leaflet?
If one is looking to target business owners delivering an impressive catalogue can be a great help.
Business owners and managers tend to be very busy and are likely to not have the time to visit your website to see your portfolio. If you can include your best work/products within your brochure you skip the need for anyone to visit your site first.
This can help with response rates for b2b campaigns considerably if done correctly.
On the other hand if you deliver an impressive brochure to people’s homes they are more likely to keep it for longer than a single page leaflet.
Using multiple pages invites people to flip through your catalogue and interact with it. When done correctly this can have a great impact on your response rates for door drops as well.
The advantages of catalogues
In our market research we have found that most people find it easier to browse a physical catalogue to a website.
There is also less of a chance for people to become distracted while they are browsing your products.
An absolute majority of households tend to keep a high quality brochure for at least a few days after delivery. This is considerably more than a traditional pamphlet.
Many people also admit that they like using catalogues to plan purchasing decisions more than any other medium including websites.
Why not deliver yourself?
Using a professional distribution company is important for all types of canvassing.
Most of the principles from leaflets apply even more for brochures.Since production and every delivery of a nice brochure is more expensive you want to make sure that none go to waste. Using a reputable company with a high quality mapping system that excludes irrelevant addresses is very important.
The physical challenge of handling a high number of catalogues also necessitates a professional level of logistics.
Storage is a great example. A delivery of even only a few thousand catalogues could cripple a small business due to space constraints.
A professional pamphlet delivery company will have the warehouse space and staff to handle any size of catalogue delivery and distribution.
Size of your campaigns
There is no limit to the size of your brochure delivery campaign. Smaller, more targeted campaigns are more common but drops of hundreds of thousands of brochures are not unheard of.
Common uses
A good example of a smaller catalogue campaign that focuses on specific London areas would be an estate agent post-sale drop.
If an estate agent makes a successful sale in a nice area sending out a door drop to the surrounding streets is a common practice.
Informing local residents of the sale of a property that is likely to be similar to theirs and that they personally know is a great tactic.
This can be done with a simple leaflet but the effects can be compounded by using a catalogue that includes other successful sales of similar properties.
All the advantages of catalogues mentioned above apply and together with the localised nature of a drop of this kind the effects add up.
The cost
The cost of catalogue and brochure deliveries is more variable than in the case of a simple flyer.
The size, weight and format of your catalogue will impact the cost of delivery considerably.
The main reason for this is the fact that delivering brochures with multiple pages is slower than traditional distribution of single page leaflets.
Each distributor can carry only a limited number of brochures on them. The larger the brochure the smaller the amount one can carry.
When a distributor can carry only a small amount of catalogues he/she has to make more trips to his/her trolley or stock point.
As such the difference in cost between delivering a two page brochure and a twenty page catalogue can be considerable. The best way to find out how the size of your catalogue will affect your delivery cost check with your distribution company.
Design and print
Your design and printing costs will vary based on the type of catalogue you are making as well.
Due to the increased complexity of designing a brochure it is necessary to use a professional designer.
The margin for error in formatting and supplying the right files to your printer is small. The cost of reprinting thousands of catalogues due to a mistake can be huge.
Make sure to use a professional designer with experience in the field.
Repurpose your brochure
As you’ve already designed your brochure for your distribution campaigns you can repurpose what you have.
Creating a downloadable pdf that is identical to your printed catalogue and hosting it on your website is a great way to get more out of your design process.
Any professional designer will be able to do this for you for absolutely minimal cost. PDF brochures are also relatively easy to edit and therefore you can use the deisgn in the future even if you decide to make changes.
You can keep any catalogues you don’t deliver in your campaigns and bring them with you to trade conferences to hand out.
Summary
As you can see, using catalogues and brochures for your distribution campaigns can be a smart move if you plan correctly.
Many places in London are very responsive to nice brochures in place of a flyer. To offset some of the larger costs you can plan to repurpose your designs and even physical catalogues for uses outside of just distribution.
The most important point we have made in this article today would be for you to work with professionals for your catalogue drops.
